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Monday, May 1, 2017

It's Medication Time (Again)

Every time Trump does a TV interview it's like an infomercial for the 25th Amendment. -- Andy Borowitz

He is a pathological liar. The Washington Post has documented 488 lies in the first 100 days. That's about five a day; the only days he didn't publicly lie was when he was golfing and not making public statements (although no one has checked his scorecards). Carl Bernstein, of Watergate fame, stated that Trump "has lied as no president of the United States in my lifetime has, day in and day out."

He has no respect for or understanding of the Constitution. Trump tweeted not for the first time: "the failing New York Times has gotten me wrong for two solid years. Change libel laws?" When it was pointed out to his chief of staff, who whined about how the press is not sufficiently respectful of his boss, that this would require a constitutional amendment, he responded: "I think it’s something that we’ve looked at. How that gets executed or whether that goes anywhere is a different story." Something they've looked at? What does that mean? Oh, and Trump also condemned Congress's rules for passing laws: "There are archaic rules and maybe at some point, we’re going to have to take those rules on because for the good of the nation things are going to have to be different." So much for checks and balances.

He sees nothing wrong with maintaining chummy, conflict-ridden relationships with murderous dictators, including Philippine President Duterte, who Trump just invited to the White House for a play date without consulting either the State Department or the National Security Council. (As the Times summarized, Trump's "name is stamped on a $150 million, 57-floor tower in Manila, a licensing deal that netted his company millions of dollars. Mr. Duterte appointed the chairman of the company developing the tower, Jose E. B. Antonio, as an envoy to Washington for trade, investment and economic affairs.")

He is delusional. This weekend he took credit for stopping China from manipulating its currency when this stopped in 2014, before he was president. And he continued to insist that President Obama ordered the wiretapping of Trump Tower despite all evidence to the contrary -- which ended in a bizarre interview-ending exchange on Face the Nation when questioned about it ("I have my own opinions. You can have your own opinions.”)

Perhaps more frightening, is that Trump's tenuous grasp on reality seems only marginally better than his understanding of history:

I mean, had Andrew Jackson been a little later, you wouldn't have had the Civil War. He was a very tough person, but he had a big heart. And he was really angry that -- he saw what was happening with regard to the Civil War. He said, “There's no reason for this.” People don't realize, you know, the Civil War — if you think about it, why? People don't ask that question, but why was there the Civil War? Why could that one not have been worked out?

Um. "Right. Well, I have to -- I have to go now, Duane, because I, I'm due back on the planet Earth."

The 25th Amendment outlines a procedure to remove the president when he becomes disabled or incapacitated. It states: "whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President."The 25th Amendment was invoked twice during the Bush Administration to temporarily transfer power to the Vice President when Bush underwent a colonoscopy. It is time to use it permanently with regard to another asshole